Protecting Our Water

We are protecting the Great Lakes and ensuring Ontario families and farms have access to clean water

An adequate supply of clean water is essential to our health, environment and economy.

In 2014, you elected us to build Ontario up. Since then, the Ontario Liberal government has introduced measures to protect our lakes and rivers, including investing over $200 million in comprehensive source water protection and a plan to sustain the Great Lakes, which are the source of drinking water for most people in the province. We have also increased the fee for water taking and imposed a two-year moratorium on new or expanded water bottling operations. And we have helped reduce municipal sewage outflows by investing in wastewater infrastructure, requiring pollution control plans for key facilities and supporting wastewater optimization programs.

That’s why the Ontario Liberals will invest in the health of our Great Lakes and other water systems. Our plan will:

Protect Lake Erie by continuing to work with partners to reduce phosphorous from agricultural sources and to enhance storm water and wastewater management

Better manage the effects that population growth and development are having on Lake Ontario

Enhancing monitoring and research to protect the Great Lakes

Extend the moratorium on new and expanded water bottling if, by the end of 2018, the science shows that is the best approach to protecting our water resources

Work with Grassy Narrows and partners to identify all contaminated sites and develop and implement a comprehensive remediation plan to clean up mercury contamination in the English-Wabigoon River system, including the immediate provision of $85 million in dedicated funding

Work with municipalities to standardize sewage bypass reporting to the province, support municipalities on how to best notify local communities of bypasses and complete low-impact development guidelines to reduce water flows entering sewers